One Room Challenge Spring 2018: Week 5

It’s week 5 of the One Room Challenge! The final update before the reveal and things are coming along, but I do feel time slipping away on all my little projects. Even after being in this exact position 4 times now, I daily vacillate between confidence and trepidation of the final completion and impending reveal.

To appreciate the how far the room has come, I think you need the be able to compare the photo from last week to this week’s.

If you scroll back and forth (kind of like the find the differences images from the Highlights Magazine) you will notice the antique entry doors were installed but it was the finishes from Metrie made the most dramatic change this week.

The lovely curved trim now beautifully outlines nearly every edge of the library bookshelves. I also started installing the moulding to the fireplace surround. All of the moulding installed went up super fast and was ready for primer and paint in record time thanks to the Ryobi One Pin Nailer!!

Y’all, it really is the perfect tool for this job. Want to see why? Watch this little clip from my Instagram Stories below.

Eliminating the step of applying wood filler and sanding the holes left by larger nailers, meant that I was ready to paint as soon as the moulding was up! In comparison, I generally apply wood filler and let it set several hours or often overnight before I sand. That’s a lot of time wasted!

The tile finally arrived and I was able to install both the back panel of brick-looking tile as well as the black marble hexagon tile to the hearth.

The purpose of adding tile to the back of the faux fireplace was mostly for dimensional aesthetic. Because there are a pair of windows opposite the fireplace, I felt like just painting the back of the fireplace wall black would look flat and totally fake.

It may turn out this was a severe case of overkill, but I always try to add as many layers of detail as possible.

In preparation for the moulding on the surround we built out the base to the appropriate depth. The hardest part, the crown, was installed on Wednesday and the rest of the moulding will be installed on Thursday.

The main chandelier arrived this week, but unfortunately many of the panes of glass were broken. I expressed to them my need to have them replaced before next week. We shall see…

If you look closely at the photo above and below, you will see that the sliding hardware for the library ladder was installed. I still need to build the actual ladder though. I am not using one of the library ladder kits available on the market because honestly, they are incredibly expensive. The DIY’er in me knows there has got to be a way to do this for at least half the cost of those kits and I’m determined to prove it!

Oh, and about the antique doors. I have painted the fronts and I am waiting for all of the moisture to evaporate from the stripping and neutralizing process before I refinish the back of the doors. I decided to paint the front side of the doors to provide a cohesive look with the black iron door in the foyer. The front door was obviously the side that was exposed to the elements on the building where it once resided and had a great deal of damage that stripping would have completely ruined.

So, that pretty much covers this week. Here’s what is left to do.

Finish moulding around the fireplace.

Apply finish to inside of doors, as well as repair work to damaged trim.

Build and install ladder.

Style library wall.

Finalize art for wall behind the desk.

Bring in leather chair and possibly small side table.

Gosh, that’s quite the list. Especially when you consider I have a house full of family here for our son’s college graduation this weekend! Thankfully, they are super supportive and most of the list can be worked on in short spurts or can be completed early next week.

Be sure to check on the progress of the other Guest Participants here as well as the Featured Participants. As always, my deepest appreciation goes to Linda for keeping this event fun and fresh with the media sponsor, House Beautiful and the addition of supurb video content from the Home Love Network.

Again, many thanks to my partners this week, Ryobi Power Tools and Metrie! They provided materials that make this transformation possible!to

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Comments

Leslie I love your library wall and that faux fireplace is awesome and amazing. I think I need to do a library ladder for my office too. But not on any shelves but to allow me to climb up and get stuff that we store on top of our open top closets in that room. Hmmm, I’ll have to think on it, that would surely make it easy access and more useful.